San Francisco vindicator., 1887-07-30
PECULIAR CUSTOMS.
Baptismal superstItions Prevailing Among
the Transylvania Saxons.

Baptismal SuperstItions Prevailing Among
the Trsnsylvania Saxons.
The Saxon mother is careful not to
leave her child alone until it has been
baptized, for fear of the malignant
spirits, who may steal it away, leaving
an uncouth elf in its place. Whenever
a child grows up clumsy and heavy,
with large head, wide mouth, stump
nose and crooked legs, the gossips are
ready to swear that it has been changed
in the cradle. more especially If it prove
awkward and slow in learning to
speak. To guard against such an ac-
cident, it is recommended to mothers
obliged to leave their infants alone, to
place beneath the pillow either
prayer book, broom, a loaf OF bread
or knife stuck point upward.
Very cruel remedies have sometimes
been resorted to in order to force the
evil spirits to restore the child they
have stolen, and take back their own
changeling. For instance, the un-
fortunate little creature, suspected OF
being an elf, was placed stride upon
!. hedge and beaten with a thorny
branch until it was quite bloody; it was
then supposed that the evil spirits
brought back the stolen child.
The infant should not be suffered to
look at itself in the glass till after the
baptism, nor should it be held near an
open window. A very efficacious pre-
servation against all sorts of evil spells
is to hasg round the child's neck a
little triangular bag stuffed with grains
of incense, wormwood and various
aromatic herbs, and with an adder s
head embroidered outside; gold coin
sewed into the cap will likewise keep
the spirits away.
Two godfathers and two godmoth-
ers are generally appointed at Saxon
peasant christenings, and it is GUS
tomary that one couple should be old
and the other young; but in no case
should husband and wife figure as
ol-parents at the same baptism, but
each one of the quartet must belong to
different family. This is the general
custom; but in some districts the rule
demands two godfathers and one god
mother for boy-two godmothers and
one godfather for a girl.
If the parents have lost other chill
dren before, then the infant should
not be carried out by the door in go-
ing to church, but handed out by the
window, and brought back in the same
way. 1t should be carried by the
broadest street. never by narrow
lanes, else it will learn thieving.
The god-parents must not look
round on their way to church; and the
first person met by the christening pro-
cession will decide the sex of the next
child to be born-a boy, if it be man.
If two children are baptized out of
the same water, one of them will soon
die; and if several boys are christened
successfully in the same church, there
will be war in the land as soon as they
are grown up Many girls denote
fruitful vintages for the country when
they have attained amarriageable age.
If the child sleeps during the bap-
tismal ceremony, then it will be pious
and good-tempered; but if it cries. it
VIII DU bed-tempered or unlucky;
| therefore, the first quesCron eolsod ny
| the parents on the return from church
is generally: WAS it a quiet baptism?"
and if such has not been the case, the
sponsors are apt to conceal the truth.
| --P0pular Science M0nthly.